How to Avoid Injury with Massage

How to Avoid Injury with Massage

We all love a massage, don’t we?

Aside from helping to avoid injuries and visits to the Physiotherapist, massage goes a long way for your overall wellbeing. And let’s face it; it’s also an unabated luxury, pampering, relaxation, bliss… yep, you can sign me up for all that. But the true power of massage goes beyond this. In fact, way, way beyond this.

When delivered correctly and by a trained massage therapist, massage can work wonders. A balance of physical and emotional wellbeing? No problem. Enhanced sports performance? Sure thing. Staying fit, healthy, and feeling good for longer, in both body and mind? You got it.

So yep, relaxation is great. But there’s a whole galaxy of other health and wellbeing benefits and injury prevention waiting for you when you book yourself in for a massage.

Prevention is Better Than any Cure

A good massage therapist understands that prevention is better than any cure, stopping major injuries in their tracks and keeping you healthy, happy and at your best.

Get the Blood Pumping and Help Avoid Injuries

It is our bloodstream which delivers oxygen to our muscles and keeps them in good working order. Massage stimulates the blood flow and is a major contributor to good muscle health and of course avoiding workout injuries.

Leave the Pain in the Gym, Where it Belongs

This week the deadlifts have been living up to their name. I’ve been doing my stretches, getting all limber, but my muscles afterwards… well… they might not be dead but they certainly felt that way. My legs were screaming for forgiveness. Stupidly, I timed my reentry into fitness badly. Enter the masseuse and a much needed deep tissue massage! Not for me as we were fully booked at the Spa! Hey ho, always a lesson learned.

The key part of fitness, for me, is bouncing back. You go hard, you get sore, and then you’re back, bright and early, to carry it on tomorrow. It’s relaxing (although maybe not in the way you might expect) and it is the only way to stop those nagging aches, pains and build up of lactic acid. Massage is key to the avoidance of injuries in the gym or whatever sport you partake in.

If only all life’s inconveniences were so easy to get rid of, eh!

Prevention is Better Than any Cure for Your Overall Wellness

We may think massage is a way of winding down after a competition or after a tough week in the office. But the treatment is also a useful preventative measure.

I put my detective on when I’m with my clients, on the lookout for signs of potential injuries. Injuries such as muscle tears, inflammation and stress on bones and joints.

A good massage therapist knows prevention is better than any cure. It’s far less stressful to the body to stop and help to avoid major injuries in their tracks. This will go along way to keep you and your wellbeing healthy, happy and competing at your best.

Now drop and give me 20!

Stress Relief

A benefit of pretty much any type of massage therapy.

Keep on Bending it Like Beckham

Scar tissue; my old nemesis. If you play sport or enjoy an active lifestyle, you are likely to have built up some scar tissue over time.

If you’re anything like me, you’ve got quite a bit of it! Massage can help to reduce and break down this scar tissue, giving you better muscle flexibility and range of motion in the joints.

Fix Up, Look Sharp

Getting focused, being sharp… it’s all in your head, right? Well… not entirely. For me, focus begins in the body. A great massage drains way all those external stresses and strains and gets me in the right place to achieve focus and mental sharpness.

An active lifestyle is about more than just physical health and strength; it is about determination and discipline. It’s about knowing yourself well. The right massage can help you achieve this and create overall wellbeing.

Being an All-round Super Hero. A Routine for Developing Physical and Psychological Wellbeing.

A Little note from Sarah.

It took me a while to get there, but I finally learned to embrace ‘me’. That’s right; to make time for me to be… well… me, and to indulge my physical and emotional wellbeing.

Living in Thailand, (check that box!) I’ve learned so much since arriving here. Having Thai, deep tissue and trigger massage on a regular basis, helps me to keep my body keenly honed and my mind calm, relaxed, but alert. It also helps avoid injuries, whether they be sport and fitness related. Or all too often for me, simply sitting at my desk for too damn long! (I need to work on checking this box)

Inactivity and sitting in the same position plays havoc with my back, neck, shoulders as well as my mouse arm. Not to mention my mouse hand. Speaking of which, this is one of my FAVOURITE areas to massaged, ears too, but that’s for another time.

Aligning my body and mind is such an important part of my massage routine. I try to get 1.5 and if time permits, 2 hours in every week. I am blessed with massage ‘shops’ galore on my doorstep, and they are super cheap. Over in Blighty, I get it’s not quite the same. That said, an hour once a month is better than zero a month. Trust me, it won’t be long until you start noticing the benefits of how massage impacts on your overall wellbeing. Before long, it will be on auto-reschedule in your calendar.

The downside to such a variety of choice is a high standard of training isn’t guaranteed. This is so important as having an unskilled therapist is possibly worse than no massage at all.